https://github.com/spy16/droplets
This project is far from complete. Would like to hear some feedback from the community before continuing on this.
Every single Go program starts with a simple layout - empty directory and main.go file.
Once you start adding things, you create more .go files in the same folder, and only when it grows bigger you start thinking of moving some abstractions into separate packages.
The key difference with most other languages is that in Go folder means "package", not "namespace for bunch or files". It's a crucial difference that important to keep in mind with Go. And what is (sub)package? When do you need new subpackage? It's just a higher level way to abstract logic or system component - make it more isolated than just concrete type, change the naming and usage API to be more clear and self-sustained.
Before that, you don't have to create new packages (=folders) in Go.
The vast majority of all Go projects will never need `internal` or `cmd` folder, not to mention `pkg` or `web`.
Just start with main.go and let it grow naturally. The simpler and easier your package is, the better.
This is not to say that the layout is a standard or the best possible one. It has it's advantages and disadvantages (a whole git repository and a blog article is dedicated to describe both aspects. Hence, I will not get into that discussion here). I chose the layout simply because it's already a well documented one. That being said, I will be more than happy to see other layout and even refactor the structure.
Open source projects generally are not typical web apps or REST API services. They are platforms or tools like docker, kubernetes, Hugo etc. While these projects are good usecases for studying golang code, they feel very complex due to their specific non-simple (if not complex) domain. My idea was to have a web app and API service project which has dead simple domain but highlights the coding practices so that newcomers can read and understand without having to understand what containers are etc.
Few other clarifications I would like to make:
- every directory is not essentially a package in Go. Only directories that have at least one go file are packages. Internal and PKG are not supposed to be packages in that sense. They are just a superficial boundaries between internal and public code.
- web directory is not a package in this project.. it contains static asset files.
- simplicity is something i absolutely love. That is the main reason I like golang. If you look past the outer structure of the project and dig into the code and packages, I think you will see the simplistic design inside. My other projects (e.g. https://github.com/spy16/radium) follow the simplistic method you explained.
I'm creating a web service with Gin, and I have moved each http request handler into its own file. I would like to be able to pass these request handlers to Gin's router with pageA.Handler, pageB.Handler, pageC.Handler, etc, but compiler won't let me because function names have to be unique. Creating unique names for each handler function works fine, but personally it somehow feels messy.
Am I thinking anti-golang way, if I want to namespace these request handlers?
Current project structure felt like non-Go way to me, let me explain why, I always thought go packages should be independent (not sure about sub-packages though)
`encoding/json`, `encoding/gob` they do share concept of encoding/decoding, but contain totally different implementations, types, models, logic inside. whenever you change something in `encoding/gob` package, you don't need to touch `encoding/json`
but in proposed structure. whenever you want to add some logic, you would end up adding stuff in multiple places, starting with `domain`, then `stores`, then `delivery` (but this is exception, since this would be changed anyway as this is view layer), then other places.
Wouldn't it make sense if you update only specific package (except view layer)
let's say, you have `user` package with all necessary models, storage, business logic related to user and dependency from `core/db` package. Now you want to add avatar to user, change only in `user` package and that's all.
same with auth mechanism, call your package as `auth` and have a dependency on `cookies`/`session` and `user` package, if you want to add OAuth2 only change auth, no need to add yet another model to `domain`, want to add token based auth, again just change auth package set/create necessary tokens on top of `session` package using `user.Entity` or `user.GetID(authedEntity)`
I am not saying it's not possible to move towards the pattern you are suggesting. But since i decided to demonstrate Clean Architecture in this, i went with the current pattern which shows clear boundary between layers. In other words, what is used and what you are suggesting are just 2 patterns having their own advantages and disadvantages. It is probably not appropriate to call one or the other `non-Go way`.
But now that we have discussed this, i am interesting in trying that as well. Not sure if i should refactor or create a new project.
